The galaxy picture is an example of what you can do with a couple of simple functions. It works a little differently with different versions of PS but its just a matter of bumping the amount of noise up or down a bit. Start by opening a "New" file 500px by 500px, 72 res in RGB mode. Name it Galaxy lesson. Press the "D" key to set your foreground to black and hit Alt+Backspace (Opt+Delete) to fill the layer with black. Next, go to Filter, Noise, Add Noise and click on it. When the Dialog box comes up set it to 100, Uniform and check the Monochromatic box. Click OK. Go to Filter, Blur, Gaussian Blur and set the Radius to "0.2". (I know, it doesn't look like that did anything, but it was important. The next step won't work if you don't) Click OK. (At this point make sure that you are viewing your project at 100% or you will not see whats actually happening.) Now hit Alt+L, J, L to bring up the Levels dialog and change the first input setting from 0 to Somewhere between 150 and 200. Click OK. Presto! Note: Always keep your Levels on their own adjustment layer. That way as the picture comes together you can still adjust them if need be. If you're working in a higher dpi you'll need to raise the noise level some. eg; 300 dpi you'll need about 125 on the noise level. Told you it was stupid simple, was I right?